Graduate
The Creative Writing program in English at The University of Texas at Austin offers two-year Master of Arts degrees in poetry or fiction. Our program is complemented by a nationally-renowned department of literature, the UT English Department, and one of the world's largest archives for twentieth-century literature, the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center.Incoming grad students have an opportunity to participate in the editorial process of the Bat City Review, an entirely graduate-student-run journal of the best in contemporary poetry and fiction from writers at all different stages of their writing lives--from Pulitzer Prize winners to those just beginning their careers as published writers. The Bat City Review is a nationally distributed journal and past contributors have included Steve Almond, Aimee Bender, Billy Collins, Denise Duhamel, Stephen Dunn, Paul Muldoon, Barbara Ras, George Saunders, Helena María Viramontes, and C.K. Williams.
The UT English Department is home to a distinguished group of fiction writers and poets. Current permanent faculty in fiction includes Michael Adams, Oscar Casares, Laura Furman, Zulfikar Ghose, Elizabeth Harris, Rolando Hinojosa-Smith, Peter LaSalle, and James Magnuson. Our permanent poetry faculty includes Kurt Heinzelman, Judith Kroll, Van Jordan, David Wevill, and Thomas Whitbread. Recent visiting faculty includes authors James Hynes, Frank Moorhouse, Mylene Dressler, Kent Nelson, Ana Menendez, Lisa Sandlin, Hayan Charara, Karen M. Olsson, and Patrick McGrath.
The MA program in Creative Writing offered by the English Department is a separate program from the MFA program offered by the Michener Center for Writers, but MA students also may benefit from the resources of the three-year program founded in 1993 and made possible by a generous endowment from the late James A. Michener. The Michener Center augments and enriches the graduate writing program in English (fiction and poetry) as well as in the departments of Theatre and Dance (playwriting) and Radio-Television-Film (screenwriting).
A candidate must be admitted specifically to the M.A. program in Creative Writing, and a current student who desires to change to Creative Writing from the PhD program must obtain the approval of two members of the Creative Writing faculty.
This English department does not offer a Ph.D. in Creative Writing. Students admitted into the Creative Writing program who wish to continue into the Ph.D. program in English must apply for formal admission in consultation with the English graduate adviser.
More information about the Creative Writing program, including a degree plan, may be found on the Masters Degree program page.